Moon Ring
by Purple Mongoose
Summary: [LotR/SM] After first season SM (anime), during The Two Towers of LotR (book). Frodo/Usagi-ness. [Holy cheeznits, Batman! That's no miracle - that's an update! II: Teaser.]
1. Author's Notes

Moon Ring   
~   
Author's Notes   
  
  
  
  
I'm not too sure why I have begun this project, other than the fact that I am reading Tolkien's Lord of the Rings four years after when I read The Hobbit (which I read when I was merely ten). I'm way too excited for the first LotR film (my father has promised to take me to see it), and I already like Frodo's appearance in the films (Elijah Wood is…shall I say kawaii?). So…as far as I know, this is the first, and only, Sailor Moon/Lord of the Rings crossover. And, yes, it -is- a Frodo/Usagi fanfiction. *^.&*   
  
The character appearance of Frodo in this is that of his movie counterpart (Elijah Wood). Not that it matters. :]   
  
The continuity for the SM parts/characters is pre-SMR. Queen Beryl has been defeated, the senshi have had their memories of their SM experiences wiped, and Ann and Ail have not arrived. The outer senshi are not present, Chibi-Usa will not appear, the cats are…somewhere, and Mamoru is hospitalized (as seen in the last episode of the original SM season). (*cackles*) For the LotR continuity, the following will be set in the timeline of The Two Towers, when the Fellowship has been split into three groups. The majority of this tale shall be set in Middle-earth (LotR).   
  
Until I have finished Lord of the Rings, little other than this author's notes, the prologue, and perhaps the first chapter will be posted. So, please, be patient. (I'll be done reading LotR by Sunday of this week, at the most.) Thank-you greatly!   
  
PallaPlease/Purple Mongoose.   
November 8, 2001. 


	2. Chapter Information and Blurbs

Moon Ring   
~   
Chapter Information/Blurbs [Updated Regularly]   
  
Explanation: This little thing gives a short summary for each chapter/part, so that (going on the idea that somebody out there actually reads this thing) a reader can locate a favored chapter or a chapter they left off at without having to do all that guessing. (That purpose won't be useful until around fifteen chapters are posted, but, still, it has to start somewhere.)   
  
-Author's Notes: Self-explanatory.   
-Important Characters: Information about Frodo Baggins, Pippin Took, and the One Ring. [to be updated]   
-Chapter Information/Blurbs: See 'Explanation.'   
-Prologue: The little how-the-wacky-stuff-begins thingie. ::finished::   
-Chapter One [Rock Bottom]: Usagi discovers she isn't in Tokyo anymore and must escape a rogue Orc on her own, then meets a particularly frightening creature - Gollum. Frodo and Sam are taking turns with sentry duty as one sleeps and the others plays guard, only to find that Gollum has followed them, and the former hobbit has a surprise with him (it?). ::finished::   
-Chapter Two [Thistle Down]: Usagi and Frodo have an argument, with Sam deciding he doesn't like Usagi for behaving derisively towards the youngest Baggins hobbit. Gollum murmurs a few out-there things about the One Ring and Usagi convinces herself that the whole experience is an awful nightmare. Luna finds Usagi's empty bed in the pre-dawn morning and must take drastic measures with the Tsukino family's minds. The Ginzishou is missing and Ami begins to have strange visions. ::in progress::   
-Chapter Three [Hey Ho]: Usagi wakes in the night to find Gollum watching her and her brooch clutched in her hand. She begins to wonder if it really is a nightmare. Luna tracks down Ami and the two receive a startling visit from none other than the spectral manifestation of Queen Selenity. ::planning stages::   
-Chapter Four and On: Undetermined as of yet. 


	3. Prologue

Moon Ring   
~   
Prologue   
  
  
  
  
The moon was a glittering half orb perched up, somewhere, lost in the limbs of the skeletal tree brushing up against her bedroom window. Tugging the coverlet around her chest, she tucked her knees up under her chin, staring out the window at the foot of her bed at the glistening stars so high above. A tiny music box, gilded gold drifting in silent ivy shapes along its edges, tinkled along its delicate melody. Two figures, a man of curling dark hair and gentle face, a woman of gold locks and blushing countenance, danced forever together, hands melded into indistinguishable lumps that could never be separated. Slowly, the melody began to fade, plinking slower and slower until there was one last, soft note. Then silence.   
  
Usagi leaned forward and lifted the music box up off the swath of thick blankets balanced on the edge of her bed, supported by the firm whitewashed wall. Looking at the figures, she sighed quietly, pressing the lid down gently, watching with childlike blue eyes as the figures were pushed down into the inner chambers of the palm-sized box. "Sleep well," she told them, and set it down on her dresser, next to her brooch, the silver diamond-like jewel easily the size of her china doll fist. Crystalline depths were made murky and frighteningly shadowed by the eclipsing darkness of her room.   
  
The young girl, merely fourteen years in age, shifted off her bed, dropping the coverlet to the mattress and creeping across the carpet to the window, nightgown hanging loose at her collar, strings untied at the top, though knotted lower, so as to preserve modesty. She pressed her palms against the night-cooled glass, knocking her forehead dully against the smooth surface as she looked up at the pearl moon, between the reaching arms of the tree.   
  
"I wish," she said suddenly, the sound of her own light voice startling her a bit in the silence, and she stopped, for a moment. After a heartbeat, she began again. "I wish I could have a Great Adventure," came the words, decisive and clear, "and fall in love with a Wonderful Hero." Tilting her head to one side, she thought quickly for a few seconds. "Please," she added respectfully, to whatever higher being was listening to her.   
  
Satisfied, she pushed herself away from the glass and, lifting her nightgown's simple, straight skirt, she tiptoed back to her bed, hoping she hadn't woken her parents or Shingo.   
  
Usagi closed her eyes, snuggled under the covers contentedly, and never saw the brief twinkle that lit her brooch's crystal.   
  
  
  
  
November 8, 2001. 


	4. I: Rock Bottom

Moon Ring   
~   
Rock Bottom   
  
  
  
  
Something sharp and hard prodded straight along her spine, whatever it was landing square between her shoulder blades. Usagi groaned sleepily and curled up into a fetal position, knees tucked to her chest and arms crossed under her chin. Thoughts eluded her, as most things do when one sleeps deeply, and she began to drift back into slumber, when the object poked her again. A snuffling sort of sound followed the motion and she grew more and more aware as a wave of hot, foul-smelling air was breathed on her neck. Reluctantly, she cracked on bleary blue eye open, only to see a monstrous creature easily surpassing anything she had ever seen before in sheer ugliness.   
  
Perhaps a tiny portion of her mind was pleased that she managed to startle the creature and cause it to reel back when she screamed piercingly and lashed out with her fingernails instinctively, gouging at the thing's eyes. "Oh my God!" she screamed, clambering swiftly up to her feet, all but bolting backwards until she was pressed against what was apparently a rock face. "Oh my God!" she reiterated, grabbing up a large blunt stone and hefting it in quivering threat. It didn't take a genius to notice that she was most definitely not in her own bed.   
  
The hideous thing, black flesh and all brute force, grunted angrily at her and pawed at the thin streams of blood trickling out of the corners of its eyes, leathery flesh barely marred. It rattled off something in a frightening language, a feral sounding guttural that, quite frankly, scared Usagi even more than she already was. Truth be told, she couldn't understand what the words were, but the meaning was obvious.   
  
"Get away from me!" she yelled shrilly, watching as the thing slowly began to advance, an ugly smirk of some sort creasing its face. "I said, get away from me!" Desperately, she glanced at the rock in her hand and pitched it at the creature. To Usagi's horror, it merely bounced off the monster's hard forehead, cracking neatly in half as it fell back to the rocky ground. She stared for a few precious seconds, shocked. Once more, she cried, "Oh my God!" Turning, she ran along the rock wall, away from the thing, down into a small crevice pathway carved between two thick rock walls that went up and up for a few meters. Behind her, the thing was running, too, if more ponderously than she was.   
  
It was dark all around her, she noted dismally, stumbling over a crack buckling up from the rocky ground she was running doggedly across. A few wavery stars peeked down at her through the crack above, between the walls, and she glanced at them for a second, drawing comfort from the sight of a familiar sky. The silver moon was barely visibly to her left and, somewhat encouraged, she pushed herself onward, trying to tell herself that the uncomfortable burning in her lungs was merely imagined. Seconds passed into minutes and she finally burst out of the crevice, onto a ledge overlooking a cliff drop into thick, obscuring mists far below. "Not good," she heard her own voice say calmly, feeling as if she was detached from her voice. A nightmare, this had to be a nightmare…   
  
The loud thumping of the monster's running was growing louder in her ears and she turned so that her back was to the ledge's drop, her arms limp by her sides. "Don't worry, Usagi," she attempted to reassure herself, unable to stop the shivers trembling throughout her body and the lone tear that twisted out of her angelic cerulean eyes. "This nightmare will end before you can die." That wasn't an incredibly uplifting thought, in any case.   
  
Squeezing her eyes shut, fisting her hands at her side and stiffening up, she prepared for the worst. Ready and waiting, she stood there for seconds, hearing the creature and its horrid breathing coming closer.   
  
And then the sounds stopped. Cut off cleanly and in a second's notice.   
  
"Where is my precious?" a new voice, slimy, high-pitched, simpering, asked pitifully and she opened her blue eyes. A spindly little wasted creature bent over the motionless, hulking body of the first monster, thin fingers moving agitatedly around. A large, bulbous head was perched on the new being's bony neck and its eyes were lidded over, nostrils flaring as it sniffed at the dead body.   
  
Usagi covered her mouth, a sickened feeling growing in her gut, and almost stepped back, remembering just in time about the very deadly fall a few feet behind her. Was everything in this dream messed up?   
  
The new being showed no signs of being an out-front threat, but, nonetheless, it caused a primitive sort of fear and revulsion to rise up inside of her. Besides, hadn't it killed that monster? What if it killed her?   
  
Suddenly, the thing swiveled its head around, sniffing at the air almost fanatically. "A Big Folk, hmm?" it murmured to itself, creeping away from the body and moving slowly toward Usagi. "Girl smell, it has, yess. Smells pretty, like untainted rose. Where is my precious?" The words were strange, the accent peculiar, and the sentences were spoken in a rambling, distantly insane voice. It tilted its head up, so she could see its face perfectly.   
  
A stifled cry burst out from between her fingers.   
  
"Help us find my precious?" the thing said hopefully. "We must find nasty thieves who took Gollum's precious. Yes, must…"   
  
Bile was replaced with pity and she couldn't understand why, other than the fact that…Gollum?…seemed so incredibly hopeful. "I suppose," she said reluctantly. After all, this was only a dream, right? "Where do we go?"   
  
The Gollum thing smiled, a particularly ugly sight, and lifted on spindly hand up. "Follow us," it instructed her. "Nasty pungent smell of thieves everywhere! Go down." It pointed down the ledge behind her as she grasped its hand in her slender one. A fleeting look of horror took root in her eyes.   
  
"Down?" Usagi squeaked.   
  
"Nasty Baggins boy is thief!" Gollum hissed dangerously. "Follow them, follow them."   
  
Usagi swallowed.   
  
  
  
  
"You sleep for a bit Sam and take my blanket. I'll walk up and down on sentry for a while."   
  
Sam reluctantly accepted the blanket and sought to make himself as comfortable as possible in the freezing shade of the boulder, pulling himself into as small a ball as he could, trying to conserve heat. "Wake me in an hour or so, Master," he mumbled, his worn mind already beginning to fall into dreamless sleep.   
  
Frodo nodded, though Sam, whose eyes were now shut, could not see. Pulling his cloak tighter about himself to keep warm, hopefully, the younger hobbit walked slowly down a ways, one hand trailing along the cliff rising above them. Smiling ruefully to himself, he looked up at the clear moon shining fully down upon the cold rock all around and whistled a soft note or two, forcing himself to not look at the down side of things. At this point, though, he mused mentally with a dry laugh, there weren't many up things about the whole experience in general.   
  
He ceased his walking, staring up at the night sky, at the inky blue velvet dotted by glimmering star diamonds, and smiled up at the beautiful night, eyes fixated in particular on the thick, bright moon, soft waves of light drifting down from it.   
  
An old memory, of an older tale he had once been told in Buckland, when just a child fast approaching the awkward tweens stage. Wrinkling his eyebrows together, he crossed his arms over his chest, searching through the foggy mist of half-forgotten memories. Something silly, he remembered, something he had thought was altogether far too girlish to interest him.   
  
Something about a princess, dressed all in silver-white, captured in the moon like a song-dove in a gilded birdcage. How she protected the Shire from dark forces and was one of the true defenses along the Old Forest. How she was doomed to remain forever a prisoner of her duties, unless she was to fall in love with a being from Middle-earth.   
  
Stuff and nonsense, Frodo reminded himself. Just a tale made up to amuse little hobbit-girls.   
  
He resumed his walking, his pace far brisker than it had been before and his attention deliberately turned away from the moon. Rock gleamed dully at him and shadows flinched around formations of stone, thick, black, and ever waiting for a dark reason. The shadows he trusted only so far as he could grab them in his hands, which, of course, was impossible. Although, and he shivered, he wouldn't be very surprised if he found he could touch shadow-flesh this close to tangible evil.   
  
A sparkle of briefly reflected moonlight caught his eye and he paused, stooping down to one knee, one hand gently wrapping around a small, silver-trimmed box. He lifted it to his eye and, tilting his head to one side in curiosity, he noted that, though the craftsmanship was obviously excellent, it was chipped in a few spots and dirt had smudged the bright paint on side. A key, jammed into a nonexistent hole, was merged with light gold metal, surrounded by designs of silver ivy and faded pink roses. Frodo stood up, trailing his fingertips around the box's edges as he began to walk back quickly to where Sam had fallen into a deep slumber.   
  
The curly-haired hobbit hesitated for a moment, then, grasping the tiny key between thumb and forefinger, he turned it four-and-a-quarter times in the proper direction. The silent night was broken by a tinkling melody that drifted out of the box like a stream of delicate bubbles, the bronze lid lifting up and back as a small platform rose up to where the lid had been; the circular platform turned slowly and two tiny doll-figures turned with it, their features blurry and not incredibly distinguished. "Music box," Frodo whispered, a bit surprised, to himself, sliding into a sitting position, his back to the boulder by which Sam slept. Holding the music box in his hands, he stared in a sort of wonder at the trinket. "Where did you come from?" he asked it, softly. There was no answer, no meaningful blow of the wind, no mystical sign. Just the song, and the man and woman dancing stiffly, yet comfortably, with each other in enviable perfection.   
  
He lost track of time, watching the dancers and listening to the wordless tune wafting away in the chilly wind. Finally, the music wound down and, without thinking, he turned the key again, if only to hear the airy, otherworldly music once more.   
  
With a soft sigh, Frodo Baggins leaned his head against the boulder and closed his eyes, falling into a light doze.   
  
  
  
  
Usagi was stunned momentarily from the bruising drop. She had been able to cling to Gollum for most of the way down, until they were forced to drop due to a perfectly sheer wall below them. "Oooo," she moaned, clutching at her head. This was easily becoming the most realistic dream she had ever had. Blinking away the stars blinding her eyesight, she staggered up to her feet, swaying in a drunken fashion. Cold winds breezed through her thin nightgown and she shivered, crossing her arms and wrapping her hands around her upper-arms, rolling her lips in to wetten them unconsciously. "Where are we?" she shivered, glancing worriedly back at Gollum. The gaunt creature rolled onto its feet and jabbed one bony little finger across the stone path, toward a shadowed figure.   
  
"Thief, thief, filthy thief," Gollum hissed, venomous eyes blinking rapidly in anger and discontent. "Baggins boy!"   
  
Usagi tip-toed forward, one hand falling to hold up the overly long skirt of her nightgown, the other gathering up cloth at her collar. From Gollum's rattling earlier, as they, or rather, it, climbed down the cliff face, she had figured that whoever this Baggins thief was, he most certainly had to be as horrid as the first creature. An Orc, Gollum had said that thing was.   
  
What she saw Baggins to be, though, was most definitely not horrid. Curling dark hair, tangled and gleaming with moonlight, a soft face that, oddly enough, verged on being pretty. "He doesn't look unpleasant," she turned to say to Gollum. Her eyes, however caught on a familiar box set down on the ground by the Baggins being's knee. "My music box!" she gasped, indignant. Dream or no dream, he had her music box!   
  
She reached to grab it and was stopped by a hand clamping down firmly on her wrists.   
  
Usagi looked up into a pair of beautiful grey-blue eyes.   
  
  
  
  
November 9-10, 2001.   
(Chapter Two - Thistle Down - in progress. More character development. And Pippin!) 


	5. Note To Readers PLEASE READ

Moon Ring  
~  
Note To Readers  
  
  
  
  
For about an additional week from tomorrow, "Moon Ring" will be on hiatus. I know, I know: I've already *had* it on hiatus for the past month or so. But now it's official. ;] To those who have reviewed after seeing the movie, I beg you to read the books, please. (To Slim Gohan - I've already read the books a few times, and I know that Gandalf becomes the White. :] But it's wonderful that you've read the books!) I've seen the movie twice (once the day it came out [12/19/01] and again on Sunday [12/30/01]; it did deviate from the books, but I absolutely love it) and plan on seeing it several more times before it leaves the relatively small town I exist in. Also, seeing as I'm working on finishing the process of reading "The Silmarillion" (also by J.R.R. Tolkien; I *highly* recommend it), bits and pieces of the mythology in it may make their way into scenes in this humble little crossover.  
  
The above paragraph sort of leads into this next: I have a one-shot LotR/SM crossover that was actually inspired by Hugo Weaving's wonderful portrayal of Elrond in the film. (He was sort of like Queen Serenity of SM in my eyes when I read the book before the film - he was necessary to the plot, but I didn't really care either way. When I saw the film however, I was blown away. "Men are weak." :] I was reminded of "The Matrix" - in a good way - in which he played the head Agent, or the bad guy. Mr. Weaving is a favored actor of mine, now. *smiles*) I know I am a Frodo/Usagi fan/writer, at least for "Moon Ring," but I got this little niggling Usagi/Elrond idea that won't leave me alone. (I should have the fic up by Friday; it *will* have major spoilers for "The Silmarillion," so be forewarned.) That and I have been a closet Galadriel/Frodo fan since I first read the books; the movie only enhanced that for me. 0o; Me, need therapy? Why? *grins*  
  
In addition, I *have* seen "The Breakfast Club" again (I've seen the movie two or three times a year on various channels since my parents first let me see it on TNT way back when I was, what, two or three? The edited TV version[s], that is - with the dirty words cut out), so I have several Bender/Claire ideas and I'm refining an Allison/Andy idea I've been nurturing for a couple years now. (It's a rather neglected bunny. *winces*)  
  
Sooooo...the point of this whole, unnecessary notice is to make it known to the readers that I will have the next chapter of "Moon Ring" up, hopefully, by Wednesday of next week. Until then, God bless!  
  
Purple Mongoose/PallaPlease.  
Quote of the Day~  
"I wasn't dropping no eaves!"  
~Sean Astin was *excellent* as Sam Gamgee - is it just me, or is Sam the friend every girl should have? I *want* a Sam (for a friend). (I also want a Pippin, but that is a completely different matter. *turns bright red* So I'm the one girl on Earth who read the book a second time because Pippin was funny; so I'm the one girl on Earth who thinks Billy Boyd [the Scottish actor who portrayed Pippin] was cuter than Elijah Wood; so I'm the one girl on Earth who...I'm going to stop before I go stare at the pictures in my "LotR: Visual Companion" again. .- Gomen!)  
  
Well, that was a rant. Indeedy-deed, it was. 


	6. II: Thistle Down TEASER

Ami prided herself on being the sort of intelligent, bright young girl that was staunchly open-minded, but suitably skeptical in certain trying situations, with a level-headed attitude that might come quite in handy if the future so demanded it. Certain rules applied to nature and her place in it, such as the basic laws of physics like gravity, to the more complex ones she found satisfying to know; if her body was going to pop like a balloon without a spacesuit whilst aimlessly drifting through the cosmos at any point in the near future, she wanted stubbornly to know why. Slightly more personal rules, the quiet ones of a child pertaining to her father's abrupt departure from her life, existed to set the youthful and nearly forgotten foundation of her perception of the world, but she hardly considered those anymore. Today, though, she was rapidly running slipshod in a panicked, screaming manner through every single memory she had logged away in her photographic memory, as if something existed therein that might help her justify what she was currently experiencing.  
  
She was failing miserably.   
  
"You talked," she said in a trembling voice to the black feline – lanky, feminine, and somehow annoyed in appearance – currently crouched on her windowsill. Clearing her throat, the small, shaggy-haired girl tried again, the timbre of her voice quavering, "But that's absurd, of course, as you're a cat and everyone knows cats simply can't talk. You aren't biologically inclined to such, and I must be overextending myself with my studies." Perhaps she should only attend two cram schools a week; three really was overkill, especially if she was going to begin having eerie hallucinations involving talking ebony cats speaking of undying evil and some rabbit who had gotten itself into a bloody awful mess.  
  
"Oh, for God's sake," quipped the cat in irritation. Ami felt the urge to blink and, deciding she had little else to lose, promptly obeyed it. "Of all those impulsive girls, Ami, I would've thought you at least to have some recollection of Usagi, much less the princess." The sulking look that passed swiftly as a shadow over her already soot black face strongly implied she was hurt the girl had not remembered her as well and the petite teenager shuffled her feet guiltily on the blue carpet of her bedroom. "You have the eidetic memory, if I remember correctly." The cat hesitated then murmured thoughtfully, "Or maybe that was Rei…"  
  
"Hino?" asked Ami before she could inform herself she had gone stark mad. At the cat's sudden piercing gaze, she shrunk slightly and, almost stammering but managing to save that dangling scrap of her dignity at least, offered in weak retribution, "Of the Hikawa Shrine down a ways. I've met her before, once, I think." My God, she thought with amazement, and she blurted, torn between scientific excitement and the blunt cats-can't-speak-you-raving-loon sanity tussling for control of her senses, "You really can talk, can't you?"  
  
The cat looked at her as if she truly were mad, which somehow managed to give her a chastised feeling and another urge to shuffle her feet over the carpeting. "Of course I talk, Ami," she said icily, miffed, and continued, "and if you really have forgotten, I am Luna, and I am most displeased that you who I have counted on the most cannot even drag up the faintest memory."  
  
"Well, I'm very sorry," Ami replied honestly, a sorrowful expression on her face belying the fact of her internally deciding she was obviously sleep-deprived and in need of a good sedative. "If I happen to meet any more talking cats in the future, I'll try a bit harder to remember them."  
  
Luna's expression was a priceless mixture of disgust, insult, and exasperation.  
  
--  
  
A teaser from the second chapter of 'Moon Ring' (which I'm finally working on again, thank God!). I should expect it in about a week. Flame me not, people! ^-  
  
My sincerest apologies for the length of the wait, and I promise some Frodo in the coming chapter, some Pippin, and a full explanation of the scene I took this from. Good eve, ladies and gents!  
  
Palla.  
  
June 8, 2003. 


End file.
